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Tomb Raider Gameplay Impressions

True to Crystal Dynamic's word, the gameplay footage shown at E3 marks a dramatic departure from previous Tomb Raider games. This is Lara Croft as we've never seen her before: here she gets skewered, cocooned like a spider's dinner, and so covered in filth we barely recognize her underneath all that grime and blood. You can hear the desperate whimper in her voice as Lara stumbles her way around the cavern that she's trapped in. Not long after a plunge drives a sharp spike into her side. It was hard seeing Lara pull out that spike. I winced at hearing her pained scream as she forced it out. The connection the developers want us to feel as Lara attempts a mad, desperate rush to escape her cavernous prison feels more plausible, more intense. Here, our inexperienced adventurer is a human being, not the voluptuous icon we've come to recognize. This is Lara before we knew her as the Tomb Raider, after all.